Maybe I’m just not following the right-wing media anymore (and I’d certainly never eat anything that came from Taco Bell) but I always thought of this as a basic truth-in-advertising issue; you can’t call it beef if it isn’t.

Even if it’s replacing beef with healthier and more environmentally friendly alternatives in this case, it sets a bad precedent if companies can falsely advertise their products.

This is just another example of the fundamental amorality of corporations. If they can inadvertently save money by making something healthier, they will do it. On the other hand, if they can save money by making products that are more deadly, they’ll just as soon do that.

Although I agree that the sentiment of her argument borders on offensive, an important issue is that most Americans don’t actually know what they’re consuming when they go out to eat. If it spurs legislation that you can’t label something a certain food when it’s made up of mostly chemicals, that’s a good thing. And FYI—the cheese is mostly wheat as well. I recently purchased cheese from the grocery store and discovered the back label said “60% cheese.” Horrific! I’ll never let my label-reading slip again.

#1 Maronan, truth in advertising is a government regulation. We can’t have any of them there gubmint regumilations in our tea party world.

My best friend worked at Taco Bell in college. He showed me the box the beef came in and it was labeled “Grade D—Fit for human consumption”. The fact that those words were even on there after the FDA grade is why I’ve never eaten there since.

Rightwingers have also been really ratcheting up the Big Brother (or rather, Big Sister) symbolism regarding Michelle Obama and the push for healthier food—the meme’s been out there for a while, but I’m really seeing a lot more of it in rightwing political cartoons lately.  I guess the rest of us are supposed to be intimidated or shamed or something by their eagerness to kill themselves more quickly?

I actually feel bad for them that they allow themselves to be led around by the nose like that, but that’s more along the lines of pity than intimidation.

IIRC, They never call it beef. Taco Bell consistently uses the term “beefy” in their advertising. Meaning it’s not beef, it’s more beef-like. Sort of like the meat process in a doublemeat palace burger.

Honestly, Taco Bell is about the only place I can eat when I have to get fast food because their vegetarian choices are surprisingly non-greasy. I try to stay away from fast-food meat as much as possible and when I’m hungry and on the road, a bean burrito from taco bell is a lot more appealing than a big mac.

I don’t know that this is just a right wing thing, though obviously they seem more susceptible to advertising claims.  Much/most junk food is now being sold, in part, as “sinful”, and somehow more delicious because you’re “bad” for eating it.

@serious bette #4: Sorry, but that’s an old urban legend, as there’s no such thing as Grade D beef:

http://www.snopes.com/food/prepare/badmeat.asp

Also, it’s not exactly shocking that a product based around meat that is really cheap is filled out with some cheap starchy things.  My family recipe for meatballs, stemming back from Italy, involves about as much in the way of breadcrumbs as beef.  Anyone who has ever made a meatloaf has also but bread in them.  Both products have “meat” in the name of the dish, but it’s not really offensive to anyone.

Brilliant post. Taco Bell is great if you’re on a budget. They’re the only fast food place I know that has an $0.89 menu, and it’s actually fairly good.

“But the issue that’s driving this is that there isn’t enough beef in the tacos, and no so much that there are all these non-food chemicals in them that are used ostensibly to make the food more appealing. “

I’m just not seeing this in the article linked. Of course I can’t begin to guess at the motivations of the people involved with the suit, but surely the rational reason for opposition would be, you know, “anti-dusting agent.”*

But then, I have the luxury of living somewhere where people hate neither healthy food nor pleasure, so perhaps my idea of “normal” is off.

*For all I know this could be a perfectly healthy and normal part of faux-beef. But I think my hesitation to put something that sounds like a Pinesol ingredient in my body is understandable.

The link said that it’s because it’s not beef, highlighting the vegetable filler.  It’s possible the LA Times got it wrong; if you have proof of this, I’d be happy to see it and update it.

I always suspected Taco Bell was selling sawdust and circus animals so I guess it could be worse. Still, if I want veggie tacos, I’d like some actual veggies,* not this processed soy and corn mulch masquerading as “beef”.

*My wife makes an amazing veggie taco with zucchinis and peppers and pinto beans. Yum!

We need a clean-up (banning) of Stick Rool on the previous thread.

Actually, I am relieved about this.  I read the headline that someone sued Taco Bell over the meat and I immediately had thoughts about Upton Sinclair Jungle type of stuff.

Agreed that it’s sad to see people so disgusted by the concept of “oats”. However, the FDA has established guidelines for what can be legitimately sold and marketed as meat. (In the LA Times article, this number—40%—is referenced but not sourced; i think the write up at the WaPo law blog sources it.)

TB hedges by calling it “meat” rather than “beef,” but this particular substance allegedly does not qualify as meat under FDA regulations, either.

If the allegation is true, then Taco Bell is in the wrong because they are lying, not because veggies R Bad. Like the commenters at 1 and 3 have said, truth in advertising is important, and progressives should be in full favor of a correctly informed populace, even if that well-informed populace still makes unhealthy choices.

If they call it beef, it should be beef as a reasonable person understands the term.  Whether beef is healthy, good for the environment, fits within the Pollan-Waters Approved Food Choices That Poor People Can’t Afford or Access paradigm or whatever doesn’t enter into it.  Just like food labeled “vegetarian” shouldn’t be made with chicken broth, beef derivatives, or anything else like that. 

And the bit reading “places like Taco Bell have this disgusting, bad-for-you food, and then they price it so low” should really read “places like Taco Bell have this disgusting, bad-for-you food that is made extremely cheap by concerted bipartisan efforts to artificially support the politically connected grain and meat industries through subsidies and lax regulations.”  If Taco Bell raised their prices, they’d just be gouging.  They sell it cheap because they can, and because they’re competing against other subsidized bad food offerings.  Making low price sound like an act of corporate malfeasance is simply wrong - the rot goes far deeper than that.

(Also, not that it would make a difference, but a few of those fillers, while technically veggie-based, are crap. It’s not steel-cut oats, it’s basically reject pig feed.)

Oh amanda, don’t you get it? if you don’t eat enough beef your dick will fall off, its dangerous not give people their hot beef injection. I think that gives me at least two levels of wrongness.

Yeah, going along with Kitten Parade.  We were quite relieved to hear that it was just vegetable-derived filler stuff, and not anything that made the low-quality beef presumed to be in there look good in comparison.  Our honest reaction?  Textured vegetable protein is awesome in chili and on cheap “sausage” pizza, sounds better in tacos than the body parts we assumed were in there.

But, yeah, truth in advertising.  If it doesn’t meet the minimum requirements to be called beef, even as low as that percentage may be, that’s just not right.  In this case, the filler may happen to be innocuous, and even pretty decent sounding if you pay attention to labels, but it’s still not right to violate FDA standards.  I like having the minimum standards for our foods enforced - they’re pathetic enough as it is, if someone violates them, they need to be called on it.

Best take on the consumer outrage over this that I’ve seen yet.

@John Joel Glanton: The actual language used for that particular ingredient is “Soybean Oil (Anti-Dusting Agent)”. It sounds a lot scarier when they leave off what the anti-dusting agent is, doesn’t it? Of course if you want to avoid the Pinesol ingredient, you might want to dodge the sodium phosphate. It’s illegal to use it in washing powders now, but that used to be where it was mostly found. It was linked to kidney damage and caused algal blooms.

I don’t really know what the woman’s motivation is. If it’s a lack of information or allergy information, she’s definitely in the right. A lot of that stuff can cause allergic reactions, and you wouldn’t automatically assume it would be in “beef”. If she’s angry over a lack of beef it’s a false advertising issue, even if her reason for demanding one food over another is a stupid one.

If there are laws about how much cow flesh a product must contain in order to be sold as beef, then Taco Bell should have to abide by those laws, or rename that taco filling “beefy fiesta mix” or something. I don’t care if they’re making up the difference with organic ancient grains or roof tar.

Taco Bell sucks and it has always sucked since I first saw one about 25 years ago. Yuck!

What I don’t get is that this woman lives in California (ne Mexico North) and she’s getting her “Mexican” food from Taco Bell? I can throw a rock from my house and hit at least six places that make fresh, delicious, authentic Mexican food (many with vegetarian offerings as well). Why they even bother having Taco Bells in CA (or any southwestern state, really) is beyond me.

Gizmodo got a picture of the label on a package of Taco Bell “beef” filling, and it reads:

Beef, water, isolated oat product, salt, chili pepper, onion powder, tomato powder, oats (wheat), soy lecithin, sugar, spices, maltodextrin (a polysaccharide that is absorbed as glucose), soybean oil (anti-dusting agent), garlic powder, autolyzed yeast extract, citric acid, caramel color, cocoa powder, silicon dioxide (anti-caking agent), natural flavors, yeast, modified corn starch, natural smoke flavor, salt, sodium phosphate, less than 2% of beef broth, potassium phosphate, and potassium lactate.

Assuming this in the usual order, it suggests that the filling is mostly beef, water, and some sort of oddly-processed oats, since presumably everything after the salt and chili pepper doesn’t amount to much.  The lawsuit claims that the filling is only 36% beef, which is certainly plausible.

Dammit, now I know why I had all those allergic reactions to plain beef burritos. How do I get in on thsi lawsuit?

Sorry Amanda, normally I respect your opinion even when I disagree (and I don’t disagree all that often), but this is just hypocritical of you. You’ve posted before about how vile it is to trick vegetarians into eating meat, and this is no different. You tell people they’re getting one food, and give them another? That’s kind of evil—what if they’re allergic to soy or oats?

I mean, yeah, it’d be great if more fast food WAS made of more nutritious, better for the environment ingredients… but if I ate Taco Bell I’d be horrified to find out their beef was only 40% beef, not because of the other ingredients in the beef, but because it means I can’t trust ANY of their food to be what they say it is. (Which I already didn’t, because that place smells unbelievably nasty, but you get my point.)

Mark@25: Why they even bother having Taco Bells in CA (or any southwestern state, really) is beyond me.

For all those white folk who like “Mexican food” but don’t like it spicy and don’t want any Illegal Immigrants handling their food.

Not a fan of the mislabeling.

But also not a fan of the idea that saturated fat is bad for you, it isn’t.  There are a lot more people (particularly northern europeans like myself) who have problems eating grains than have problems eating meat.

Soy is also not so great for me, which is a shame, because I used to eat Luna bars every morning for breakfast, and they were delicious.

So, agree to disagree on this one.

@Ismone,

Do you follow a paleo diet? I try to when I can.

Yeah, close to paleo.  Has made my life, and the lives of family members way better.

As someone allergic to both wheat and soy, yeah, I’m appalled. Not too crazy about the apparent overload of salt, either.

Don’t eat much Taco Bell, but remember back in the ‘70s when it was the only Mexican food in New York City, and the beef burritos included actual beef.

I feel safe in saying that a paleo diet is pure woo, especially since the “paleo” in question likely reflects only what was eaten in the ancient Middle East and south/southeastern Europe. I guarandamntee you will never find a “paleo” diet based on, say, tomatoes, turkey, guinea pig, and the Three Sisters.

I think the gizmodo article sums it up, but legally beef is beef with no more than 30% beef fat content, and “meat filling” or something similar is what has to be at least 40% meat.  So if they lawsuit’s info is accurate, Taco Bell is not even meeting the eminently reasonable requirements for “almost beef.”  There’s no reason to not force them to be more honest about their cheapass food.  It’s not like their customer base is a group of finicky eaters.

I agree with Amanda that stretching meat with wheat and soy fillers is not a bad thing.  There’s no such thing as grade F meat but Taco Bell does use the “cutter” grade meat, which is the lowest grade you can sell as beef.  You’d never find it in a store.  I got no problem with pumping that up with fillers.  However, 65% fillers is a lot of damn filler, especially if they’re known allergens, so it’s important they be clear on this.  It is also true that the sheer amount of corn and soy we eat in filler form (basically anything from a box is chock full of that stuff) will cause another set of health problems entirely and some people, like me, like to keep an eye on their consumption of that kind of thing.  I don’t need to be accurate to the gram but I’d never have guessed the stuff was supermajority filler.  People are freaking out like we just found out the soylent gorditas were made of people, and Taco Bell is silly for fighting the suit when a quick settlement and a good PR campaign will make this go away fast.

This was funny to me because my roommate works at Taco Bell, and the day the lawsuit was filed, before it hit the news, he spent a large amount of his evening arguing with a family that claimed he was serving them raw beef - it had to be raw because it didn’t look like the ground beef they made at home.  It’s not really possible for Taco Bell to give you raw meat because it’s already cooked when they get it.  They just reheat everything by boiling it in a bag then pouring it into a steam tray.

Oh, I don’t buy full into the paleo diet stuff. But at least I *think* I feel better when avoiding dairy, refined sugar, processed foods, and an excess of grains.

The end result is I end up eating mainly veggies throughout the day. Call that what you will, but it keeps me feeling great.

BrianX,

The reason I say “close to” is because I don’t really eat what people ate back then, but I do eat almost no sugar and starch, and it really has improved a lot of things for my (hypoglycemia and prolly inflammation and definitely weight).  Mostly, I think eating simple, whole foods while paying attention to what your ancestors ate and what issues you may have as a result (i.e., grains aren’t great for me due to my Northern Euro. heritage) is a good idea.  It is entirely possible that people whose ancestors ate rice for hundreds and hundreds of years wouldn’t do so well on what I eat.  I don’t know.

If I were native American, eating the three sisters might be a better idea for me.  But I’m not.

I can’t even imagine eating at Taco Bell. I’m trying to think of circumstances where eating at Taco Bell would be preferable to just skipping a meal, and “gun to the head” is about all I got. It’s not food: it never has been. It’s not even plausibly food-like substance the way something like McDonald’s is. Not that I would eat there, either, but I can see myself with a cranky toddler and just saying what the hell, an order of fries won’t kill us. But Taco Bell? I’d rather deal with the cranky.

Amanda, I think you’ve slipped into selfrighteousness here. Really? It’s problematic that someone paid a company for a food they were told was beef, found out it wasn’t beef, and is suing over the misrepresentation?

I mean, if that’s so ridiculous, I’m sure you’d be perfectly happy to buy coffee from me and find out it had been adulterated with brick dust (actual historical problem before companies were held responsible for the food they sold being what they said it was). After all, I was doing you a favor, my “coffee” has less of that nasty caffeine you shouldn’t be consuming anyway.

I’m opposed to lying to kids about the content of their food on the same basis, actually. If someone serves me a dish, I want to know that what’s in there is what they’re telling me is in there. If I were vegetarian I wouldn’t want someone deciding for me that meat broth is perfectly okay in a rice dish. If I were a Jew I wouldn’t want anyone deciding for me that a little bacon grease in my salad dressing is fine. I avoid sucralose because it gives me headaches, and I don’t want someone lying to me about whether it’s in my food because they disagree that i can tell the difference. I don’t want anyone serving me diet coke instead of regular because they think I’m too fat to be drinking regular coke. And so on and so forth.

Funny thing, I’ve often heard stories about kids spitting out food when they find out what’s in it, as if that were a common occurrence. But I’ve never once actually seen it happen. What I *have* seen is a lot of kids shrugging and saying “oh” and then, in the future, happily continuing to consume (say) my carrot cake muffins but still avoiding carrots in all other forms. If a kid did spit out a mouthful of something I would probably think the ingredient in question was something deeply, powerfully repulsive to them, and who the heck am I to police that?

I remember once eating a fairly tasty seafood chowder and finding a tentacle after half the bowl was gone. Try as I might, I wasn’t able to finish that chowder. The unexpectedness was part of it; I would probably say “sure” if you asked whether I would like to try something like escargot, but if you told me the dish I just consumed had snails in it, when I wasn’t expecting that, I’d get green around the gills.

The bottom line is, if you’re an individual it’s mean to trick people into eating things, and if you’re a company it’s illegal (as it should be). Food is personal, and each of us has the right to decide what we do or don’t want to consume.

I’m not quite sure there’s a proper word for what Taco Bell is. It’s less than food—it’s, i dunno, fuel. The one or two times I’ve had it, I found it flavorless.

So, are there any Taco Bell “restaurants” located downstairs from a barber shop operated by a Mr. Sweeney Todd?  Maybe insufficient beef is the least of the problems…

So, the Taco Bell around the corner definitely has “beefy” burritos on the promo board as I drove by.  Is this new, in respect to this?  I try to notice when things are advertised with food adjectives instead of nouns - ever since the rules about what can be called “chocolate” went specific, and suddenly chocolate chips weren’t.  Beefy, cheesey (or worse, cheezy), meaty, XYZ-style, I try to notice those in my food.

But, since I only get the hankering for TB approximately twice a decade - will have burning cravings for it out of the blue, will eat it three times in a week, I won’t be able to get enough, and that’s it for at least another five years - I don’t pay attention to their advertising, since it has zero impact on whether I’ll eat there or not.  If it’s during one of my craving times, nothing would keep me away.  If not, nothing could entice me to choose it, other than maybe being stranded in an airport when nothing else is open.  Road trips, no, not good driving food.

Presuming that it’s in response to being caught violating the rules for calling something beef, as it would be mentioned somewhere in some of the reports that they’ve always used the undefined beefy.  Which is a weird word to use when not talking about Hanes.

I’m going to swim upstream here and state that I like Taco Bell, and I am unashamed of it. I always buy from the Fresca menu, a bean burrito and two crunchy tacos. Maybe it is partly oats and filler, but I really don’t care. It’s cheap and good, as far as I’m concerned.

Not only are the beef tacos, not beef, they’re not even a half-assed cheap protein source.

Apparently, the filling is less than 15% protein, which means there’s not much soy protein, either.

Nor will the protein content be fulfilled by the “cheese” on top, made mostly of wheat.

Nope, not a ridiculous lawsuit, not if it, ya know, you expect other food corporations to obey even the ridiculously lax laws concerning food preparation.

Here’s the rundown on the Jack in the Box taco for comparison:

Beef Regular Taco Filling Ingredients: Beef, Water, Textured Vegetable Protein (Soy Flour, Caramel Color), Defatted Soy Grits, Seasoning (Chili Pepper, Maltodextrin, Spices, Wheat Flour, Salt, Dry Garlic, Hydrolyzed Soy Protein, Corn and Wheat Gluten, Monosodium Glutamate, Dry Onion, Disodium Inosinate, Disodium Guanylate, Succinic Acid), Salt, Tomato Paste, Worcestershire Sauce (Distilled Vinegar, Molasses, Corn Syrup, Water, Salt, Caramel Color, Garlic Powder, Sugar, Spices, Tamarind, Natural Flavor, Sulfiting Agent).
Tortillas Ingredients: Ground Corn, Water, Lime.
Contains Soy, Wheat

I think at some point in the history of this “beefy” treat, the TVP upstaged the beef as the main ingredient. Without the processed crap the ingredients sound a lot like what I use when I splurge and make veggie “beef” tacos: TVP, onion, garlic, smoky chili powder, red chili flakes and Bragg’s.

Being from Southern California it always floored me to see people eating at Taco Bell (or Del Taco) when there was usually a far superior burrito stand on the same block and one with reliably vegetarian or vegan options with a few miles.

The article stated that the litigant did not want money, just an accurate description of the taco filling. Even though that makes the lawsuit a bit more reasonable, I think the ingredients in fast food have become so easily accessible that exactingly accurate billing is somewhat moot. If the case was that the ingredients themselves are misleading or inaccurate, I could get behind that because it is necessary information for many people and falls within ethical business guidelines. As someone with a whole host of dietary restrictions, both self and genetically imposed, I am all for accurate representation of food no matter the source, and yet for me this is still a stretch. That being said, I feel a bit of self-indulgent satisfaction over someone suing Taco Bell just for the fact I think their food is nasty AND there is one on a leg of my favorite running route that never changes the oil in their fryer and the smell stays with me for a good mile.

In addition to not healthier for those those allergic to wheat, soy also or not healthier by a long shot for those who experience problems with a heavy refined-carbohydrate load.

I’m sorry, but I think you’re very off base on this. This is about basic truth in advertising and food labeling, not about getting all the cheap red meat you’re entitled to as Real True Non-Commie Red Blooded American or about how soy turns you into a girly man or something. It’s comparable to the vegetarian furore over the beef extract in McDonald’s fries.

“I feel safe in saying that a paleo diet is pure woo, especially since the “paleo” in question likely reflects only what was eaten in the ancient Middle East and south/southeastern Europe. I guarandamntee you will never find a “paleo” diet based on, say, tomatoes, turkey, guinea pig, and the Three Sisters.”—BrianX

I don’t know about guinea pigs, but none of those other staples existed in anything resembling their current form before the advent of agriculture. That doesn’t mean they’re unhealthy for us. Humans co-evolved with our crops just like we co-evolved with dogs and cats. Arguably, we’re made for each other.

I’m not convinced that a true paleolithic diet is nutritionally superior to the kind of minimally processed diet that Brian is describing. Whereas, there’s massive evidence that minimally processed diets in general are superior to modern diets based on refined flour, unnaturally fatty meats, and refined sugars.

If anyone’s curious about the literal paleolithic diet, as in, what our ancestors probably ate during the old stone age (2.5 million-12,000 years ago), I highly recommend this lecture by Dr. Neil Mann, an Australian nutritional biochemist/anthropologist:
http://media.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/socanth/ubvo/Kissack11Feb09.mp3?CAMEFROM=moxacuk

The “paleo diets” that you read about in diet books are largely woo. But researchers actually have quite a bit of evidence about what the literal paleolithic diet was like. Most of the energy came from meat, and most of the micronutrients came from plants. So, by volume, we ate a lot of plants, mostly non-starchy vegetables. A lot of neo-“paleolithic” diets under-emphasize the critical survival role of veggies in our diet and just hype meat. 

Also, ironically, if you’re eating American supermarket beef and chicken fattened on corn and soy, you’re recapitulating many of the nutritional deficiencies that led people to contemplate a paleolithic diet in the first place. The fatty acids in the meat depend on what the animal ate. We stuff as much junk food into our livestock as we do into the population at large.

There should be almost no reason that a person who cannot eat gluten could not eat a taco.  At Taco Bell?  There isn’t a whole lot a gluten-sensitive person CAN eat.  I ate there just today and had nachos and pintos.  I think my other options are tostadas or rice.  Oh boy.  And the nachos are iffy, but I don’t care about fryer contamination.  No, the cheese does NOT contain wheat.  The cheese—even the nacho cheese—is perfectly safe. 

A taco should never contain gluten.  Period.  You can go on about tricking people into eating oats, but do you know how many people just figure, “Tacos!!  I can eat tacos!!” only to end up glutened??  Yet their taco shells (not the tostada shells, oddly enough) contain oats (which tend to be contaminated**) and so does their meat. 

**Likely the reason the oats say (wheat) is due to the contamination issue.  I can eat oats just fine from specific sources, but give me some mass produced Quaker type oats and I won’t feel well.  The farming equipment gets used for the wheat fields and the oat fields, so there’s a lot of contamination going on. 

It’s just too bad that the better and more gluten-friendly Mexican places are all at one end of town, whereas all I have near my campus (IN the campus) is Taco Bell.  :/  Taco Del Mar makes a pretty awesome baja bowl (like a burrito in a bowl).  I think Taco Bell used to make something like that, but they don’t anymore. 

Uhh ... so yes.  Ingredients matter.  “No harm in slipping you a few oats” ... = no.  There could be plenty of harm. 

(And yes, sometimes I just pick up things and assume they’re safe, only to panic and check the label.  Wheat in dark chocolate????)

Forget the beef. Why is rice, like, the 30th ingredient on Taco Bell’s “enchilada rice,” per the chain’s official nutrition information website:

“Enchilada Rice

White Corn Flour, Water, Fumaric Acid, Cellulose Gum, Preservatives (Sodium Propionate, Sorbic Acid), And A Trace Of Lime. Oil: High Oleic Low Linolenic Canola Oil, TBHQ (to protect flavor), Dimethylpolysiloxane (an antifoaming agent). Nacho Chips do not contain wheat proteins; however, they are fried in the same oil with ingredients containing wheat proteins. Water, Seasoning: Salt, Maltodextrin, Tomato Powder, Potassium Chloride, Natural Flavor (With Autolyzed Yeast Extract, Maltodextrin, High Oleic Sunflower Oil, Disodium Inosinate, Disodium Guanylate, Sunflower Lecithin), Spices, Dehydrated Onions, Dehydrated Tomatoes, Garlic Powder, Onion Powder, Paprika [Color], Citric Acid, Dehydrated Green Bell Peppers, Dehydrated Red Bell Peppers, Extractive of Paprika [Color], Disodium Inosinate, Disodium Guanylate, Garlic Extractives (Contains Modified Corn Starch, Corn Starch), Onion Extractives (Contains Modified Corn Starch, Dextrin, Corn Starch), Less Than 2% Silicon Dioxide Added To Prevent Caking. Rice (Raw): Enriched Precooked Parboiled Long Grain Rice [Rice, Niacin, Ferric Orthophosphate (Iron), Thiamine Mononitrate (Thiamine), Folic Acid]. Oil: High-Oleic Low-Linolenic Canola Oil, TBHQ (To Protect Flavor), Dimethylpolysiloxane (An Antifoaming Agent).”

Does “enchilada rice” really contain less rice than fumaric acid?

No, but the ingredients list for “enchilada rice” contains periods and colons which are commonly used in ingredients lists to punctuate lists for different parts of a prepared meal, without using a vertical-space-wasting line or paragraph break. From that I think it’s reasonable to surmise that the ingredients list is truncated at the beginning; I suspect the words ‘Nacho Chips:’ are intended to appear before ‘White Corn Flour’.

You know, because that makes a hell of a lot more sense than imagining Taco Bell would serve its customers a dish primarily, *identifiably* including a substance which by itself is a white crystalline powder. If that were the case, I suspect it wouldn’t be the beef we’d be hearing about as the subject of lawsuits.

Also, I can’t even find anything called “enchilada rice” on Taco Bell’s official nutrition information website (tacobell.com/nutrition/information); the word ‘enchilada’ only even appears one time, and neither ‘rice’ nor an ingredient list appear anywhere near it. Where are you seeing this?

Here: http://www.tacobell.com/nutrition/ingredientstatement

Whoops, ‘scuse me, “beef”.

I know it’s cool and all to pile on the latest fast-food chain to fuck up in public, but why not try to keep it on a remotely factual basis?.

Redheadedfemme, I like Taco Bell too. I would be miserable on a constant diet of it but sometimes it’s just the right mix of textures and non-challenging flavors to hit the spot.

OK, so it’s there. I still don’t see a reason to assume this is some obvious concoction of chemicals appearing on their menu for $2.99, rather than a simple screw-up on the part of whatever ill-paid, outsourced web goober posted their ingredients list.

I’m not sure what “enchilada rice” looks like when it’s actually served up. Maybe it’s legitimately modeled on a casserole-type combination of tortillas and rice, with tortillas in the lead. Which would explain why white corn flour is beating out fumaric acid.

Yeah, I was gonna say—making rice out of flour? That’d be a good trick!

How accessible is the ingredient list to people who don’t have easy access to a computer?  Can you get it in the store?  If not, then the descriptive name had better be accurately descriptive.

Should we more correctly call it a “beaph taqueaux”, then?

I haven’t been to a Taco Bell in a while; there aren’t any convenient to any of the places I usually find myself, so it’s turned into more of a once-a-year treat than once-every-couple-of-months. But if I recall correctly, they usually do about like McDonalds does: post a big board somewhere in the store with calorie counts and so forth, and then have ingredient lists and more detailed information either in a pocket on the board or available by request at the counter.

I don’t know if there’s any federal regulation yet requiring fast food stores to provide detailed nutritional information at the (indoor) point of sale; if there isn’t, then I suspect either some states (including mine) have regulated already, or the fast-food companies have been doing it “voluntarily” in order to get out ahead of the regulation they expect to see, because it’s become pretty much ubiquitous at every fast food place I go to that isn’t pure drive-through. Even at those places you might still be able to ask for it and get it, I don’t know; it’s not like I need telling that the shit is bad for me, and I have no particular desire to quantify how much sooner each individual food item likely brings my death, so I don’t bother finding out.

(Actually, given Taco Bell’s apparent recent interest in positioning itself as the healthier, or at least less deleterious, choice, I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be *more* likely you’d find up-to-date nutritional info in a Taco Bell than in, say, a McDick’s or a Burger King.)

[Unrelated note: Are comment times showing up an hour off for anyone else? Apparently the site thinks I live in GMT-3, on which point I find myself forced to differ by virtue of the fact that I am not currently in the Atlantic Ocean.]

HIMH:  What you smell is the smell of warmed-up already-fried taco shells, not the smell from a fryer, which is why the smell is always the same.

As someone who has access to arcane and occult matters, I can tell you this because none of the food items in a Taco Bell are cooked.

Do they have steam tables?

Yes.

Microwave ovens?

Yes.

They are used to get already processed food up to serving temperatures.  Insurance companies like to insure them because of the high food volume while they are relatively low-risk because you don’t have anything like conventional ovens or grills that can cause injuries/damage as you would in regular restaurants.

The ‘grease’  business, getting the used oil from restaurants, is so big that many containers have to be locked because they’re outside where anyone could take it and resell it to be repurified on the grey market.

That’s not to say that HIMH’s accusation doesn’t ever happen in real life. 

There is a local restaurant that is infamous here for letting their oil stay in the fryer for a while, and it isn’t a coincidence that it has a lot of patronage from senior citizens for whom volume is more important than flavor when it comes to eating out.

“Beaph Taqueaux” is a porn name waiting to happen.

I’m someone who usually likes my ethnic food to be authentic, but I have to admit that I like Taco Bell way more than I like “authentic” mexican cuisine.

  For all those white folk who like “Mexican food” but don’t like it spicy and don’t want any Illegal Immigrants handling their food.

You are clearly talking out of your ass if you think there isn’t spicy food on the menu at Taco Bell, and quite frankly, depending on what area of the country, there are plenty of Mexicans handling their food.

But go ahead, stereotype all you want.

I always liked Taco Bell’s basic ground for its filler.  If you want full meat, they have that option.

“Beaph Taqueaux” is a porn name waiting to happen.

Performing with his sister Phisch Taqueaux?

I keep hearing for the free-market to work all participates must have perfect information during an exchange, and yet the Milton-Friedman-types and so-called “libertarians” are against printing ingredient and nutritional guide lines where it can be easily read like in the menu.

Their “excuse” is that it’s initiation of force for government to regulate things like food quality for consumer safety, apparently when people die the market is supposed to “correct” itself by people going to businesses that do print nutritional information.

Too bad that people got sick and died folks but we got to stick to our principles!</libertarian>

Of course their theory doesn’t even work after people get sick and die until it looks like government is going to step in.

Amanda, what do you think of Badtux’s take on it?
http://snarkypenguin.blogspot.com/2011/01/taco-meat-filling.html

In short: Turns out their President is threatening to sue people for reporting the news story:

Unfortunately, the lawyers in this case elected to sue first and ask questions later — and got their “facts” absolutely wrong. We plan to take legal action for the false statements being made about our food.’ Greg Creed President and Chief Concept Officer Taco Bell Corp

Thus, according to Badtux, turning a simple lawsuit into a 1st Amendment issue.  Quote:

BTW, can Taco Bell sue over allegations made in a court of law? No. The whole *point* of the court of law is to determine whether the allegations are true or not. You can file a lawsuit alleging that Barack Obama is a secret Muslim Nigerian in a court of law and there’s fuck all that Obama can do other than file a motion for dismissal based upon lack of evidence. He can’t sue the people reporting on the lawsuit either because of that whole 1st Amendment thingy

I am with people who want to know what they’re eating, especially when the woman doesn’t ask for money at all, only wants them to stop false advertising:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/fl-taco-bell-suit-20110124,0,3088351.story

Isn’t it how free market is ideally supposed to work? You cheat - you pay?

Regarding why is there Taco Bell in California: why is there McDonald’s anyplace you can get a burger at a diner?

Fast food restaurants have very late hours, they have a completely consistent flavor wherever you eat them, their prices are also pretty standardized, and they usually have drive-through. You know exactly what you’re getting when you go to Taco Bell. The stuff you get at the burrito stand might be more authentically Mexican, but the burrito stand probably closes at 5 pm, you can’t park anywhere near it and have to walk to it (at least if food stands in California work anything like food stands in the East), there isn’t one anywhere if you live in the burbs, you don’t know how much it costs until you get there, you don’t even know the place is there without some area knowledge or research because they can’t afford 20 foot high brightly colored signs, and what if you don’t actually *like* authentic Mexican food? I like Taco Bell tacos just fine, myself, but I don’t like peppers of any kind, and authentic Mexican food ladles peppers, both the various hot kinds and the not-hot kinds like bell peppers, into everything. I can’t find anything to eat at “real” Mexican restaurants.

I like a juicy fat burger at a diner or at Red Robin or Fuddrucker’s or a bar and grill a lot better than Micky D’s burgers, but the diner can’t give me my burger within 2 minutes of ordering it and can’t give it to me through my car window, which, if I’m eating while I’m on the road to somewhere else, is vital, especially if I have kids in the car. I’m sure the burrito stand works the same way.

Couldn’t disagree more, Amanda. There’s a ton of that “meat manly, veg girlie and mandated by socialist nanny state!” crap in fast food advertising and in right winger attitudes about food, but this ain’t it. Not only is there a truth in advertising issue here, but all those processed soy-based additives are not veggies, they are not really “better for you,” and are downright harmful for people with allergies. I can only see good coming from this lawsuit - people should be able to make educated choices about food and so they should know what’s really on the menu. Hopefully, something like this can lead to more questions being asked about the fast food industry and processed food. 

Not sure if it’s just a NY/NJ thing, but everyone I knew in high school and college used to call them Taco Hell. I hate fast food, but I’ve at least tried items from other fast food joints back in college, but I’ve never tried Taco Bell. We would get drunk and my friends would do a Taco Hell run almost on a dare, just to see if it would fuck up their digestive system (and how badly). That place is truly vile.

I agree with the other posters here that this is really an issue of truth in advertising.  In general, the food industry in the U.S. is terribly guilty of putting all kinds of crap into processed food and deceptively trying to sell it to the buying public as something it isn’t.  I agree with Mark Bittman that the corn and soy industry has really gone overboard in their mission to sell us cheap corn and soy food additives and fillers that are unhealthy and just plain unnecessary in the human diet, but then again it’s really all about trying to increase profit margins as much as they possibly can.

I obsessively read food labels and encourage others to do the same, but the bottom line is that lots of consumers just aren’t that savvy.  And dammit, if you’re going to try and sell people a beef taco then sell them exactly that instead of some kind of creepy Frankenbeef taco.  If they are going to serve adulterated meat product then they should be required to provide people with the ingredient list when they purchase it so that a more informed choice can be made.

I also want to ditto what others have also pointed out regarding the potential allergens or other intolerance triggers that many people may unwittingly consume or give to their children to consume as a result of companies like Taco Bell not being upfront about what’s in their meat.  Soy, gluten and even corn are all potentially life threatening allergens for some people, and while some onus is on the consumer to be vigilant the company selling the food adulterated with those allergens also has a responsibility to be upfront with their consumers about them.

What bugs me about the original post is the idea that the deception is somehow not a big deal or even acceptable if the result is that people eat more “good” food instead of “bad” food. If the misrepresentation concerned, say, the physical and psychological consequences of abortion, and the justification was to reduce the rate of abortion, then I am sure many here would be up in arms.  Deception doesn’t suddenly become OK because the goals being advanced by the deception are progressive rather than conservative.

Ha, hp, it doesn’t surprise me that there exists a kid who has done it. I just notice that it’s referred to, offhandedly, often when picky kids are discussed, as if it’s common, and I don’t think it is.

Also want to add my disagreement w/this post like the others have.  Things should be what they say they are whether they are bad for you or not.

This post just strikes me as such a stretch.  =/

I’m not sure how it is that “isolated oat product” (presumably empty carbs, and I suspect the actual oats they put in are processed enough that they don’t actually have much fiber) is actually healthier for you than beef (which, yes, contains some saturated fat but also has some nutritional value).

but the burrito stand probably closes at 5 pm, you can’t park anywhere near it and have to walk to it (at least if food stands in California work anything like food stands in the East),

No, but that is because of the car culture that developed in the relatively undeveloped Californian cities of the first 3 decades of the 20th Century, we had things like the Doggie Diner, Zims, Fosters Freeze, or the Orange Stands that used to do Hwy 99 from Bakersfield to Sacramento and beyond.

Foodstands tended to be established at the corner of parking lots, we used to have in this town 3 chili dog shacks that were located in such a way, and they would be open late because they would get the post-movie crowds or people who wanted a late dinner that would be cheap.

A Doggie Diner was the site of a historical protest:

The Vanguard youth marched, picketed and demonstrated to demand acceptance. Ravarour and his mate were interviewed on San Francisco radio where they humanized homosexuality as normal human relations. Vanguard also held weekend same-sex dances at Glide. In August 1966 a sit-in at the Doggie Diner was followed by the Compton’s Cafeteria uprising. By the end of 1966 the youth group relocated to a theatre and then to 330 Grove Street where it changed its name to The Gay and Lesbian Center, the first in the nation.

Also, Diner/Gas Stations in small towns would open late to serve travelers, especially in the summertime when it would be cooler than the heat of the day.

If you like burgers, Ms. Rogers, go to an In-n-Out if you ever find yourself in California.  You will be surprised, if not amazed at what they taste like.

I happened to go to a Red Robin a year or two ago, I found the ingredients very fresh but my spouse wasn’t impressed with their Baja Fish,  so that was the end of that.

Frankly, I always assumed Taco Bell was junk food, and that, when they say it’s a beef taco, it’s “beef” as defined in a minimal FDA requirements kind of way.

Yeah, in a minimal FDA requirements kind of way. And it turns out it isn’t even that. I’m frankly a bit surprised that so many people have really not got any kind of problem with that.

“Oh, it turns out it was made of people, but I already figured it was going to be bad for me, so it would be silly to raise a fuss.”

Sorry, I gave the wrong link for the paleo diet talk. You can access it from this page: http://www.bphost.co.uk/ubvo/seminararchive.htm

#9
nyone who has ever made a meatloaf has also but bread in them.

I never have. Always used oats.

You know what I hate?

‘100% juice’.  It’s not ‘100%’ juice if it’s filled with pear, grape, or apple sugar or grape water that’s excess from other production.

If it has more than one kind of juice in it, it’s no longer ‘100% juice’.

This goes for the stupid ‘100% angus burgers’ or ‘100% beef’ which includes fillers from some hundred different cows.

Also… Meat in tacos is supposed to be stewed, soft and pulled from the bones unless it’s barbequed or grilled like carne asada.  That means that a large portion of it isn’t going to be ‘meat’ anymore, but spices and added water and vegetables and then if they’re holding it for any time some stabilizers.

Taco Bell offers grilled steak or chicken in practically everything they put the ground ‘beef’ in for just a marginally higher price. That would seem to offer less filler. It’s what I usually get, although I’m not a big fan of the weak-ass tomato juice they laughably call ‘Fire’ sauce.

DAGCM:
Really? The smell is so pungent! This is one of those combo KFC and Taco Bell joints but the smell I’m getting is only about 30% fried chicken and 70% old burning grease. At the place I tended bar everyone had to take a turn at cleaning the fryer and emptying the grease into the trap out in the alley, so I am very familiar with the smell. Maybe I’m pegging the wrong culprit. Still don’t feel bad about them getting sued, though.

Elena, there was one just down the block from my high school that we referred to as Toxic Hell or Toxic Smell. My best friend worked there for a summer and I remember him smelling like tortilla chips and onions even after a shower, which is better than how he smelled after working at Der Wienerschnitzel.

Please correct me if I am wrong, but I am under the impression that fast food restaurants need to have ingredient information available (at the physical location) for people who have dietary restrictions / food allergies. Not that this mitigates any truth in advertising issues, I am just curious and have been unable to find verification online.

Alara, it is a bit different in California. I was in San Diego and many of the burrito stands were open 24 hours and they are located everywhere from downtown to small neighborhoods. The spice level of the food could be dialed back to zero given that most of the base ingredients are fairly bland and you add your own hot sauce and can request your own additions like onions or cilantro. Many of the generally non-vegetarian ones even started using tortillas without lard, changed their frying oil to vegetable and offered lard free beans and rice without chicken stock. It was not an issue of authenticity, which is not for me to judge, just personal preference.

DAGCM:
Really? The smell is so pungent! This is one of those combo KFC and Taco Bell joints but the smell I’m getting is only about 30% fried chicken and 70% old burning grease.

You labeled it a “Taco Bell”, and of course they’re going to have grease and a fryer at a combo KFC.

You have a habit of leaving out data, but we’re both correct, a stand-alone Taco Bell won’t have a fryer/grease smell, because they don’t fry anything at a Taco Bell.

The Taco Bell website menu still says “... filled with seasoned ground beef ...” for most of their tacos. I don’t the standard, but one familiar with tacos would expect the filling to be at least 50% beef, maybe more. I gather that at least one suit in Alabama is applying state law regulating this kind of misrepresentation.

I suppose I’m the only one here who can’t help thing of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode “Double Meat Palace” where Buffy takes a job at a burger joint and discovers a horrible secret about the meat being served in their burgers. (SPOILER WARNING - It turns out to be a vegetable product. The body parts she found left by a murderous lamprey type creature preying on customers and staff.)

@9 & 83:
Ive put both bread crumbs and oats and sometimes both in meat loaf.  Often, I use grated carrots or turnips if I want additional veggies and use milk of egg or egg white as binder.  I’m not a big fan of tofu or other soy products in meat loaves or balls even as binder though.

Crissa - even if the juice is from a different fruit it is still juice and so qualifies for the 100% label.  I’m with you on the syrupy fruit sugar additions and watered down stuff though.

I’d also like to chime in with those saying what is in it needs to be what is on the label or posted list, and it should be posted for those with alergies et al.

At PZ Meyer’s, they’ve been pointing out that the oat filler listed in the ingredients isn’t actually oats—it’s oat husks, which apparently contain about the same nutritional makeup as sawdust. Mmmm yummy.